


Heart Vacancy

by howl-to-the-wind (greenleaf)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Derek Has Issues, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Even the Sheriff, Everyone Begs to Differ Actually, Feels, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Stiles Begs to Differ, derek thinks he can't have nice things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-25
Updated: 2014-02-25
Packaged: 2018-01-13 18:00:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1235854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenleaf/pseuds/howl-to-the-wind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’m in love with you,” Stiles tells him one summer night. No reservations, no pauses, no blips in his heartbeat. He says it like a universal fact.</p><p>Derek isn’t shocked, isn’t even moved by such a declaration. Because he’s always known. He responds clearly and unhesitatingly.</p><p>“I will pretend that you never said that.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heart Vacancy

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Polski available: [Luka w sercu](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3772624) by [Pomyluna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pomyluna/pseuds/Pomyluna)



> I was in a somber mood and saw this unfinished thing in my files. I cleaned it up so here it is.
> 
> Title and story inspired by The Wanted’s “Heart Vacancy”, because I'm kind of in love with the song.
> 
> Not beta-ed. All mistakes are mine. Comments and Kudoses are loved.

Derek knows.

He knows Stiles loves him. Stiles tells him clearly enough.

“I’m in love with you,” Stiles tells him one summer night. No reservations, no pauses, no blips in his heartbeat. He says it like a universal fact.

Derek isn’t shocked, isn’t even moved by such a declaration. Because he’s always known. He responds clearly and unhesitatingly.

“I will pretend that you never said that.”

Derek walks away.

 

Things remain unchanged. Stiles keeps silent, doesn’t ask Derek about what he said. In fact, he acts like Derek never even said it.

Stiles talks to him, all bright smiles, light-hearted laughter, and scalding sarcasm. He touches him easy, brief, and undemanding, with pats to the shoulder and nudges to the ribs between a joke or three. He is a constant presence, all energy and brightness, and sometimes calmness and warmth. His love radiates from everything he is, obvious and true.

Stiles is as he normally is. And that’s where the problem lies.

Derek frowns and shrugs off the hand that alights on his shoulder in friendly familiarity. He watches the corner of Stiles’ lips turn down before it tugs back up quickly. He walks out on the fourth familiar joke, pretends not to hear the stuttered pause or the huff of disappointment before Stiles continues talking up a storm.

All these are things Stiles has always done. It’s only that Derek notices them now, feels them now, realizes that these are things he’s grown used to, things that have become so constant and so normal in his life that he hardly gives them a second thought.

He suddenly realizes how long Stiles has loved him.

Derek was leaning against the loft balcony, looking up at the moonless sky, when Stiles walks in.

Stiles whispers. “I’m still me.” Just here, waiting for you.

“I know.” Derek looks at him. ”And I hate it.”

I hate you for loving me.

 

Derek still thinks about it. It’s not something he can easily forget.

He remembers the thrill that gripped him during his first taste of young love, strong, beautiful, and forbidden, remembers the heart ache that came after, and the disaster that follows him everywhere, every time he deigns to open his heart and try. It still hurts fiercely and tragically. He’s just learned to survive it.

The pack is wary. They know the story. Derek certainly doesn't tell them but they probably just figure it out along the way. It surprises him even less that they find out about Stiles’ ardent confession, if not from their sharp hearing, then from the smell of longing and heartache in the air. And Derek can’t take the sudden heavy atmosphere. He walks out.

One person follows.

“Derek…” Scott looks pained, like he actually can’t believe he’s going to go through with this.

“Leave me alone, Scott,” he hisses.

“Dude, I think you know how long he’s been waiting. And I hope you realize he’s just going to wait.” Scott sighs. “Give yourself a break, Der. Stop waiting for the bad that might never come when there’s actually something good already waiting.”

Scott walks out but not without patting Derek on the back comfortingly.

Lydia is next, cornering him in his own loft.

“Derek, he knows you don’t trust yourself to want things, to want him, but he still wants you.” She huffs. “Everything in life is a choice. You can choose to be sad or you can choose to be happy. Or you can just choose him.”

Allison and Kira never try. They know it’s not their place. Derek just wakes up to the smell of freshly-made breakfast in the kitchen and the smell of Allison’s jasmine perfume. Or gets his favorite pizza and take-out delivered to him free of charge, with a complimentary plate of sushi.

Boyd, Jackson, and Isaac don’t try as well, only offer companionship during long runs out on the preserve.

Erica doesn’t try so much as forces her way, walks into the loft dragging Stiles and all but tosses him onto Derek’s lap before walking out.

Derek helps Stiles stand up, sighing at his beta’s tactics. But Stiles persists, straddles Derek’s hips, fists his hands in Derek’s shirt, and Derek lets him sink his head in the crook of his neck, his breathing ragged as he forces back tears.

Derek knows he’ll never get over the story of his past. Not really. The pain will always be there.

Because that’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt.

 

Derek walks in on Jackson and Lydia arguing. They are squaring off in the living room, heads held high, postures stiff, and tempers flaring. It doesn’t really surprise the pack. Those two argue all the time. It’s their way of being happy and in love. So it doesn’t surprise anybody when they just lunge at each other, all teeth and tongues and high tempers simmering into want.

Erica rolls her eyes and drags Boyd to her room. Kira and Scott walk to the kitchen hand-in-hand. Allison and Isaac just settle in the living room, turning on the TV.

Derek rolls his eyes at them all and leaves to get takeout. Goodness knows none of them will do it. Someone grabs his arm. Stiles turns to look at Derek, his gaze electric and full of emotion.

Derek glares at him. Now wasn’t the time.

Stiles meets his gaze. No, now.

“We’re not like them,” Stiles says, simple and easy.

“We’re worse.” Derek turns around and walks away.

 

Derek wonders why. Why him? When there are so many others.

He turns, glaring at the honey-brown eyes across the room that have been watching him for the past hour.

“Stop it,” he hissed. “Stop loving me, Stiles.”

“I can’t.” Stiles’ answer is steadfast, spoken with no pause or preamble. Derek flinches at such honesty.

Derek’s eyes narrow. “Try.”

Stiles rolls his eyes at him. “That’s like asking me to stop breathing, douchewolf.”

Impossible.

Stiles sighs and sits up straighter. “I’m not asking for anything to change, Derek. I just want you. All of you.”

Derek says the one thing he knows will hurt the both of them. “I don’t have anything to give you, nothing that’s not broken.”

Stiles shakes his head. I still love you anyway.

Derek turns away from the unspoken words.

 

“He chose you, Derek.”

It surprises him when he hears it, head whipping up to the Sheriff, who keeps his eyes trained on the map in front of him.

“Can’t say I’m surprised really,” the Sheriff says as he grabs a red pushpin and tacks it on the map. “It’s been a long time coming.”

Derek’s ears turn red. “Sheriff, I–”

“Stiles has always had a lot of faith in people, Derek,” the Sheriff continues. “It’s what makes him a good person, because he never gives up, not on anyone. And he certainly never gave up on you, will never give up on you, actually.”

The Sheriff looks him in the eye. “In the end, my son chose to love you no matter what. He decided you’re someone worth the fight. You might not believe in yourself, but believe in him.”

 

Derek’s tired of being hurt.

He counts the dozens of miles he runs, the hours he spars and trains to be stronger, harder, faster, better. He lifts, and pulls, and pushes hard enough to break himself, but it never happens.

How long does it take before a body breaks down? How many times can a heart break and take the pain?

Stiles is there when his knees shake and his legs give. He throws a towel across Derek’s bare shoulders, hands him a water bottle, and sits close to him, watches him with loving eyes. The cold hand on his face is a luxury on Derek’s sweaty and feverish skin. Stiles thumbs away the sweat on his brow.

Derek looks up at him. He’s so tired.

“You won’t hurt me, Derek,” Stiles whispers. “And I won’t hurt you. Not ever.”

Derek lives in fear of this. Not fear for Stiles, but fear for himself. Because he knows that if Stiles ever leaves, he’ll never be the same again.

Stiles is determined. Derek lets Stiles cup his cheek and press a soft kiss to his sweaty jaw.

Stiles whispers with all conviction. “Believe in me, because I believe you.”

 

Derek accepts the arms around his waist, the body that presses onto his back, the chin that rests on his shoulder. He looks up at the night sky.

“Talk to me.”

Derek holds onto the hands settling on top of his stomach.

“I ruin everything I touch. I’ll ruin you.”

Stiles shakes his head. “No, you won’t. And you know I’m damn well strong enough not to let you.”

Derek’s head hangs, bites his lip, does not know how to make him understand. I’m no good. I’m no good. Leave. Go.

Stiles turns him around, places a hand over his chest.

“I don’t care about before. You know I don’t,” he says. “I love you.”

Derek stiffens, looks away, ready to run from the words. But Stiles holds onto him tightly, trapping him in between his arms, whispers to him again and again.

“Listen to me,” he whispers, voice urgent. “I love you. I love you. I love you.”

Derek trembles and Stiles just holds him tighter.

 

Derek walks out onto the balcony. Stiles is seated on a reclining chair, reading. He looks up as Derek approaches. He looks at him, sets his book aside silently, and waits. Derek goes to him and settles in the protective circle of his arms.

Stiles plants a soft kiss to the back of his ear.

“Be with me,” Stiles says simply, easily.

Derek looks past him to the people inside the room, his pack pairing off into happy, blissful couples. Allison and Isaac are curled up in a loveseat. Kira and Scott are on the floor playing cards. Lydia has her feet on Jackson’s lap. Erica is trying to wrestle the TV remote from Boyd.

“We can’t be that happy.”

Stiles scoffs. “We’re not trying to be that kind of happy. We’re trying to be our kind of happy. I don’t need any of that shit. I just need you.”

Derek holds his hand. “Our kind of happy…”

For all Derek's unworthiness, for all his faults, for all the cracks and missing pieces that make up his soul, Stiles is always there. Derek doesn’t know what the future holds but if he will fall, and crash, and burn for the hundredth time, he’d rather it be because of Stiles than anybody else in the world.

Derek smiles and kisses Stiles softly on the mouth.

**Author's Note:**

> *drowns in feels*


End file.
